


One and Two

by yabamena



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Almost-Crackfic, Dancing, M/M, Zooey Deschanel - Freeform, sort of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-01
Updated: 2013-01-01
Packaged: 2017-11-23 04:13:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/617948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yabamena/pseuds/yabamena
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's a bank job. Arthur isn't impressed. Until he is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One and Two

**Author's Note:**

> This is entirely [ceruleansky](http://archiveofourown.org/users/ceruleansky/pseuds/ceruleansky)'s fault for pointing me at [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYvABfWf6cM). As a result, this has no plot and makes so sense whatsoever. Really. 
> 
> Thanks to [mysticshell](http://archiveofourown.org/users/mysticshell/pseuds/mysticshell) for the fast and dirty beta. Any remaining errors are my own. Hover over French text for translations.

It's a bank job.

"Seriously?" Arthur tries to pour every ounce of incredulity into that single word but still thinks he misses a few drops.

"I didn't realize your standards were so high, darling." Eames's mouth twitches at the corners as he brings his cup of café au lait to his lips, but he doesn't smile. Lucky for him because, Arthur is fully prepared to kill Eames where he sits, witnesses be damned. Arthur has five escape routes mapped out in his head from this particular cafe, seven if it's raining.

Fighting the scowl that wants to overtake his features, Arthur contemplates the merits of using his spoon as an instrument of torture. It irritates him that he can't exactly say Eames's implication is wrong. "It just seems so..."

"Plebeian?" Eames supplies as he lowers his cup, and the amusement in his voice gives the game away though his expression never changes. "That snobbish streak of yours is so unbecoming, Arthur."

Arthur gives Eames a look. "You're fucking with me, aren't you?"

Eames's hum is non-committal, and Arthur is seriously considering at least maiming the bastard. "If you're done wasting my time, I'd like to get back to my sabbatical." He starts to get to his feet, but Eames stops him with four words.

"You owe me one."

It had been a stupid thing to say, especially to someone like Eames. But Arthur had been so young at the time, so new to the game still, and Eames had just saved him from some very irate _yakuza_ , so the words just slipped out: _I owe you one._

Eames just smiled and said, "I know."

Arthur really should have known better.

But that was five years ago and Eames had yet to call in that marker - until now.

Arthur sits. "You're really going to use that now? On this?" It doesn't make any sense, not even for Eames. _Especially_ not for Eames. Unless... "What aren't you telling me?"

Eames doesn't so much as smile then as he grins from ear to ear. "That would spoil all the fun now, wouldn't it?" and it's his turn to get to his feet. He slips some euros out of his wallet and slides them across the table toward Arthur. "For the coffee. And the company." When Eames pulls his hand back, there's a flash drive sitting on top of the bills.

Arthur palms it when he picks up the money. "I still think you're fucking with me."

"And yet we both know I'll see you in Chicago next week," Eames says over his shoulder without a hint of doubt as he starts to walk away.

" _J'ai vraiment putain vous hais parfois!_ " Arthur shouts at Eames's retreating back because it's slightly more satisfying in French.

Eames turns back but doesn't slow his pace, his wide grin making him look years younger as he calls back, " _Ah, mais tu m'aimes le reste du temps._ "

 

+

It would serve Eames right if he didn't show up at all, Arthur muses later.

But Arthur has never been one to double-cross a colleague unless they really deserved it - even the irritating ones - and considering Eames and Ariadne had pretty much saved all their asses on the Fischer job...Well, suffice it to say, he probably owes Eames more like five or six. Not that Arthur will ever make the mistake of letting Eames know that. 

So he finishes booking a flight to Chicago, then goes back to nursing his beer and poring over the information crammed onto the flash drive Eames gave him.

 

+

It's a bank job, but it isn't.

At least Arthur's part of it isn't, not really.

It turns out, it's only the two of them on the job, and Arthur would be suspicious except the job is so simple it really only needs the two.

The client wants a particular bond that's being kept in a safe deposit box in the downtown branch of a certain bank. The hard part isn't getting into the bank or even into the safe deposit box. The hard part is getting into the bank vault that houses the boxes. Even with enough time and a full team, it would take at least ten hours to get past the first of three electronic locks. The branch manager knows the combinations, of course, but every bank employee of managerial level and higher has had their mind militarized thanks to the open secret of dreamshare among the corporate sharks. So going after the bank manager would be foolish at best and fucking stupid at worst.

Fortunately for them, the bank manager is having an affair with one of his tellers. 

Grace Levy is a lovely if vapid-looking thing, with dark hair and big blue eyes, and from what Eames has dug up, the manager tells her absolutely everything. Being so low on the totem pole, but privy to such sensitive information, makes her a prime mark.

Arthur's job is two-fold but hardly complex. As both architect and extractor, he'll build the dream and then rob Grace of what she knows. Literally. Eames came up with the simple, yet elegant theory that since bank tellers are trained not to resist during a hold up, that is precisely the scenario they'd use in the dream. She'd give her secrets up willingly while her projections would remain perfectly docile.

Honestly, if the job wasn't on such short notice, Eames could have done it all himself. Anyway, it's much easier to have a second man to keep an eye on things while the mark is under.

"I'm incredibly good at what I do, darling," Eames says as they're finalizing the plan. "However, even I can't be in two places at once. You needn't worry, though. This requires absolutely no imagination on your part, so you should be fine."

Arthur decides to make Eames suffer horribly for this bullshit. After the job is done, of course. He is a professional, after all.

 

+

They get Grace on her way home from a few drinks with some of her coworkers, Arthur slipping into the cab right after her. She's surprised, but there's a needle slipping into her arm before she can cause a fuss, and Eames drives them off into the night.

The sedative is strong enough to keep her under, but not so strong that it will interact with the compound for the PASIV device. It gives Arthur enough time to pull the silver case on to his lap and calibrate the dosage. The backseat of a taxi is hardly the ideal setting for such careful work, but Eames manages to avoid any sudden stops or major potholes, and Arthur is silently grateful.

He hooks Grace up to the machine, then himself, but before he hits the button, he catches Eames's gaze in the rearview mirror. "Why do I get the feeling that you're still fucking with me?"

Arthur can't see Eames's smile, but it's there in his voice when he says, "Go to sleep, Mr. Cohen."

Arthur presses the activation trigger and pretends he's not smiling as he goes under.

 

+

Everything goes according to plan until it doesn't.

Arthur tails Grace from her apartment until she gets within a few blocks of the bank. She walks because she always says she will, but never does because she always ends up running late in the real world. Here in the dream, though Grace is somehow five minutes early.

Arthur doesn't follow her inside. Instead he waits on the wide stone steps leading up to the bank while Grace settles into her routine. He glances up at the sky and suddenly the sun is several degrees more towards the west. 

It's time.

He crosses the spacious lobby, shoes clicking against the marble floor in a way that seems too loud to Arthur, but none of the other patrons seem to notice. The security guard doesn't even give him a second glance. Which is fine because when Arthur reaches Grace's window, he wastes no time. Dark Wayfarers obscuring his stony face, Arthur pushes a folded note and cloth bag across the counter.

She murmurs a greeting and smiles politely as she reaches for the note. Arthur knows the exact instant she realizes something's wrong. The note doesn't actually say anything at all but Grace believes it does, believes she's being held up, and she freezes.

This is perhaps the riskiest moment of this whole affair, and Arthur holds his breath as he waits for Grace's projections to react.

They don't and after letting his breath out slowly, Arthur opens his jacket just enough for Grace to see the butt of the gun tucked into the waist of his pants. It seems to galvanize her. Soon enough, she's giving Arthur everything she has in her drawer. Three stacks of cash, to be exact, and before they disappear into the bag, he notices that the bills are blank. However, each band holding the stacks together is imprinted with a unique series of numbers and Arthur knows he's gotten what he came for.

It really was far too easy, he thinks as he reaches for his sack of cash.

Of course, that's when things go a bit sideways.

 

+

They leave Grace resting comfortably in her apartment. She'll wake with a mild hangover, vague memories of a not entirely unpleasant dream, and no idea that she's helped rob her own bank. 

They're back at the hotel, drinking little bottles out of the minibar in Arthur's room, when Eames says, "Quick and painless, just like I said."

Arthur only nods and empties his tiny bottle of Jack, but he must give something away because Eames is looking at him with interest now. "Something you'd like to share with the class, Arthur?"

"It's nothing, just-" Arthur hates that he has to force himself not to squirm under Eames's curious gaze. "She wanted to dance."

Eames arches a brow and twists off the cap of a mini Glenfiddich, actually taking the time to pour the contents out into a tumbler. "Did she now? And did you indulge her?"

"Well, I hardly had a choice," Arthur snaps, remembering the initial embarrassing confusion. "She wouldn't give me the money unless I did, and her projections were getting antsy."

Eames shrugs. "So you did a little Fred Astaire for her. What's the harm?"

"More Gene Kelly, actually-"

"There is something of a superficial resemblance-"

"But it was just so _random_ and I-" Arthur stops, eyes narrowing. "You son of a bitch, did you know she was going to do that?" 

Eames's quiet hum as he takes his first appreciative sip of scotch is answer enough.

"I'm going to kill you," Arthur says in slow, precise syllables. "I'm going to kill you and dump your body in Lake Michigan if you don't tell me everything right now."

"Oh, do pull your knickers out of your arse, Arthur," Eames says, dismissive and far too amused for his continued well-being. "It's nothing sinister, just a bit of fun at your expense." Arthur says nothing, just stares him down, and Eames rolls his eyes. "The information I gave you might not have been entirely...complete."

"Eames."

"Our Grace majored in musical theatre, not English like her files says." Eames clucks his tongue. "But here she's stuck as a bank teller. Can you imagine how bored she must be? An illicit affair with the boss is hardly Broadway, but it's probably as exciting as it gets for her most days. It's a shame really," Eames says almost to himself. "She's quite good really. Not lead material, but she'd do well in a chorus. Tell me, did she do the desk thing for you? Because that was _adorable_."

Arthur stares at Eames with dawning realization and wonders how this man can still manage to surprise him. "The job was done before you ever came to see me, wasn't it?" He should really be more upset about it, but even he can see the futility in that route.

"Why?" Arthur asks instead.

Eames gives him a look that makes Arthur's chest ache in a way that's more familiar and comfortable than he'll ever admit.

"You were bored and I was free. And Grace is delightful."

"So you called in a marker to get me to fly to Chicago and dance around in the mind of a perfect stranger because you thought I was bored." Arthur pauses. "That's fucked up." And Arthur knows he's even more fucked up for being charmed by the gesture.

But he makes no excuses for his own mental deficiencies when he leaves his chair to join Eames on the couch. "You know, you could have just come to visit."

Eames smiles into his glass of scotch. "How plebeian."

Arthur steals the scotch and swallows it down in one quick gulp before handing the tumbler back. Eames sputters in indignation. "You wanker, that was the last of it!"

"Sue me," Arthur mutters as he thumbs open the top button of his shirt. Eames zeroes in on the motion and suddenly he's not so put out at the loss of his single-malt.

"You know," Eames rasps when one open button becomes two, then three. "I really fucking hate you sometimes."

Arthur grins against Eames's mouth. "But you love me more often than not." Arthur knows this as fact even when there are times they're not on the same continent for more than a few weeks at a time. Arthur knows this, and he's grateful.

"I owe you one," he breathes, shirt falling away under Eames's hands.

"I know." And Eames is smiling before he takes Arthur's mouth with his own.

 

*


End file.
